The Lynchian Film

It is generally recognized that there is a division in David Lynch’s films between personal films and more commercial projects—this division is most often invoked when talking about the 1980s when Lynch made the majority of his commercial films in order to have the chance to make a personal film. But this division is flawed because it does very little to explain what separates commercial films from personal films. Beyond the division between The Elephant Man and Blue Velvet, this division is no more illuminating than if it had been completely arbitrary. Where in this personal/commercial division does a film like The Straight Story fit? Or Wild at Heart? Or even Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me? A much more fruitful division is that between what I term Lynch films and Lynchian films. A Lynch film is simply a film directed by David Lynch. In the feature film category, there have been ten films total which meet this requirement: Eraserhead, The Elephant Man, Dune, Blue Velvet, Wild at Heart, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, Lost Highway, The Straight Story, Mulholland Dr., and Inland Empire. Of these films a full fifty percent are “merely” Lynch films. The other fifty percent are Lynchian films.

It has been argued that the major focus of Lynch’s films has been on the hidden darkness lurking beneath the surface of small town America, but this interpretation seems to have arisen from Lynch’s peak of popularity with Blue Velvet and Twin Peaks where hidden darkness is clearly a prominent theme—there appears to be little evidence for this theme throughout the body of Lynch’s work. Removing the stipulation of small town America from the theme does make for a more compelling case; however, in order to make it fit all the personal films of Lynch, darkness must be defined too broadly. While darkness is a major part of all of Lynch’s films, it is going too far to claim that any form of darkness lurking below the surface constitutes a Lynchian film experience.

Commonly associated with Lynch films are the use of bizarre images in an opaque way. This is a universally recognized attribute of Lynch’s films and I see no reason to challenge the view. Although Lynch’s films vary wildly in the use and opaqueness of the images (see The Straight Story versus Inland Empire), it is simply blindness to argue that this does not exist in every Lynch film. Every Lynch film involves bizarre and opaque images. Likewise, every Lynchian film contains darkness in some form or another. But the presence of this darkness is not enough to mark a film as Lynchian as this darkness is present in nearly every Lynch work. What marks a film as Lynchian is a specific use of darkness and imagery.

The Lynchian film is a representation of a subjective experience. Closely affiliated with a single character, the Lynchian film presents a world that is a reflection of the character’s mental and emotional state. It is out of this subjective limiting that the darkness and imagery of the Lynchian film emerges. Inevitably, the focus of the film is experiencing extreme psychological trauma, which leads to nightmarish develops in the world, as the world acts as a mirror to the character’s experience. The reason for the trauma can be minor or major, caused by the character themselves or some other outside actor. Whatever the cause of the trauma, the horror of the experience intrudes upon and transforms the world. Most prominently in the Lynchian film, the transformation of the world is experienced as an alienating experience in which the character disassociates itself from the world either through complete illusion that is broken down throughout the course of the film, or through a distancing of the self from the world by making the world something foreign.

In a continuum of films running from least Lynchian to most Lynchian, Lynch’s films run: The Straight Story, Dune, The Elephant Man, Wild at Heart, Blue Velvet, Eraserhead, Lost Highway, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, Mulholland Dr., and Inland Empire. Inland Empire in particular is exciting because it appears that Lynch may be evolving away from what I am calling the Lynchian film to something more focused on a web of disparate narratives overlapping and intertwined. Only time will tell what direction Lynch will move next. But because of the possible transitional nature of Inland Empire, it does not serve as the best example of the Lynchian Film—this honor falls on Mulholland Dr. Further, the most enlightening example of a non-Lynchian film is not The Straight Story, but instead Blue Velvet, which shares many traits with Lynchian films yet fails to be a Lynchian film itself.

Mulholland Dr., like Lost Highway does a fairly clear job of separating one world from the other, but like that less successful film, Mulholland Dr. immediately again blurs the line between the worlds making it unclear what the reality of the film truly is. Mulholland Dr. does a good job of representing both varieties of Lynchian films. In the first three-quarters of the film, the viewer is given a clearly delineated world from the last quarter of the film. At the same time, as the last portion of the film seems to reveal some of the reality of the majority of the film, it calls itself into question by being an almost purely subjective account shown through memory. The last sequence of the film with its threatening seniors and silent audience of one throws even what might seem to be reality into doubt. The inability to fully separate the different worlds of the story is an important aspect of the Lynchian film as it goes a long way toward unifying the two varieties.

The first variety of Lynchian film—disassociation from the world through creation of an alternative—is represented by Lost Highway, Mulholland Dr., and Inland Empire, although I’ll refrain from discussing Inland Empire because of its difficult status. As can be seen in Mulholland Dr., the hallmark of alternative world variety is that they breakdown and give way to the style of the second variety of Lynchian film. The second variety of Lynchian film—distancing from the world by making the world something foreign—is represented by Eraserhead, and Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. What separates the second variety from the first—which inevitably breaks down into the second—is that there is no attempt at separation in the second variety. Instead, all disassociating components are included in the world. These components can serve to change the image of the world, but they don’t completely sever the character’s connection to the world.

In Mulholland Dr., the majority of the film is played out in a fantasy world where the problems of reality are transformed into clichéd mysteries that have to be solved. But because of the involvement of reality in the fantasy, the elements of reality slowly take hold and destroy the fantasy world. In the final section of the film, the main character is forced to face reality, but through the subjective devices of the second variety of Lynchian film. In the second variety, reality is faced, but the subjective experience emphasizes the traumatizing elements until they overwhelm the reality of the world. In truth, the second variety of Lynchian film always overcomes the first variety, but the emphasis of the elements is important.

Blue Velvet is not a Lynchian film because it fails to take on a subjective quality in anyway. Although it shares imagery and story traits with Lynchian films, the point of view of the movie is the major determining factor. Perhaps if the film had been told from Dorothy’s perspective, Blue Velvet would be considered differently. The fact remains that Blue Velvet remains merely a straightforward story. The dark elements, the bizarreness that infests it, are merely elements of a story that have no connection to an individual’s perspective and so fail to invest the story with any true terror. Alone, Lynch’s imagery and tropes fail to have a strong impact. It is only in attaching his bizarreness to a subjective perspective that Lynch succeeds in conveying and form of darkness. Still, whether a film is merely made by Lynch or Lynchian is not the major determining factor in whether that film is good or bad, successful or a failure. It is the combination of Lynchian elements that ultimately determines the quality of the film itself independent of its status as a Lynchian film.

The Bourne Trilogy

The Bourne Identity (2002)

Director: Doug Liman
Cinematographer: Oliver Wood
Editor: Saar Klein
Writers: Tony Gilroy; W. Blake Herron; Robert Ludlum
Actors: Matt Damon; Franka Potente; Chris Cooper
Composer: John Powell

The Bourne Supremacy (2004)

Director: Paul Greengrass
Cinematographer: Oliver Wood
Editors: Richard Pearson; Christoper Rouse
Writers: Tony Gilroy; Robert Ludlum
Actors: Matt Damon; Joan Allen; Brian Cox
Composer: John Powell

The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)

Director: Paul Greengrass
Cinematographer: Oliver Wood
Editor: Christopher Rouse
Writers: Tony Gilroy; Scott Burns; George Nolfi; Robert Ludlum
Actors: Matt Damon; Julia Stiles; Joan Allen; David Straithairn
Composer: John Powell

The Bourne Identity, Supremacy, and Ultimatum are interesting because of their status as a trilogy. I could spend copious amounts of time comparing the different styles of direction and editing, but this is mostly unnecessary. All three films share a cinematographer, so the atmosphere is constant between each film. To quickly review each film’s style, Identity has an extremely strong story that is combined with a direction and style of editing that presents the necessary fight scenes and car chases in an easy to follow manner. Supremacy has the most problems style-wise of the trilogy—although the story is strong, the direction (specifically framing) is nowhere near as coherent, and the editing is the film’s greatest weakness. Fight scenes are confused and choppy and seem like an attempt to convey the fight in cuts instead of images. While this may be something to applaud in other films, in Supremacy the use of editing seems more like away to cover something up, then a style choice. Regardless of the truth of this statement, the feeling persists. Finally, Ultimatum has a passable story and the editing improves to a degree, but it is still lacking in comparison to Identity. As I said, however, it is not the styles of the films I am interested in. It is the interplay between films that I want to discuss here.

When a film is a sequel, it is not necessary that the film be treated as a sequel. However, when a film makes its nature as a sequel part of the film itself, then it must be judged in terms of its success as a sequel. It is sometimes unfortunate that this is the common tact taken for sequels.

At times, a first film in a series is made with the idea that it will continue. When this is also built into the film, the film must be judged as a beginning. Luckily, Identity avoids this pitfall by making itself a coherent whole. There did not have to be a sequel. Because Identity exists as an isolated whole, there is no reason to judge the film against its sequels.

Supremacy and Ultimatum, on the other hand, face double duty. Supremacy as a linking film that must escape from the status quo of Identity, while setting up the possibility of Ultimatum; and Ultimatum having to deal with the impact of Supremacy, while concluding the strands begun with Identity. Both films suffer from their necessary connections, but both films have different faults resulting from their placement. Supremacy suffers from a lack of movement. Ultimatum suffers from too much movement. It is abundantly obvious that these weaknesses are a result the films lack of coherence as a trilogy. Identity solves very little of the overall mystery—Bourne’s identity—while still resolving the overall conflict that is the film’s main concern. It is left then for Supremacy and Ultimatum to create new conflict and resolve the overall mystery. The execution of this in both films is less than ideal because only Ultimatum is constructed towards a trilogy as an end.

At the end of Identity, we are left with the feeling that the enemy has been defeated and Bourne can continue trying to discover his identity in peace. Supremacy has to change this status quo and it does so in the quickest, sloppiest way possible. This is a problem because it makes the second film seem like an artificial addition to the first film. However, in establishing the story of Supremacy, the way is left open for any number of Bourne stories. In fact, Supremacy feels like an attempt to set up a never ending Bourne series. The story is generally standalone despite the origins remaining in the first film, and the ending of Supremacy leaves open the possibility of an organic outgrowth of the series that would give no limit to the adventures Bourne could have. Removed from the severing motions at the beginning of the film, the story of Supremacy is incredibly straight forward and sets the stage for the fight scenes and car chases, while also establishing Bourne as a character firmly committed to righting past wrongs. It is this characterization (which is an outgrowth of Identity) and the epilogue scene that make Supremacy such an ideal starting point for a series. It serves as a transformative adventure for the franchise, which gives the series a logical continuation removed from the conflict of Identity.

It is interesting then that Ultimatum decides to completely abandon the foundation laid in Supremacy in favor of re-envisioning the entire cycle of films as a trilogy. To this end, Ultimatum introduces a large scale conflict, which was never a presence in either Identity or Supremacy. It tries to tie together all the events of the previous two films and it does this in a very obvious and artificial way—by having the enemy be an even larger version of Identity’s enemy. Both Identity and Supremacy presented small scale operations within a larger organization. Ultimatum makes the entire organization the enemy, even going so far as to make the organization a stand-in for the current US administration. While Identity and Supremacy were largely set in certain sections of the world, Ultimatum makes the whole world its playground.

In its desire to turn the three film series into a trilogy, Ultimatum makes itself the most firmly dependent on the previous films. But its dependence is an odd one. Each successive film in the series has rewritten the status quo of the previous films in a less than organic way, but where Supremacy merely tried to cut its ties to its predecessor’s legacy, Ultimatum attempts to usurp the legacy of both its predecessors by destroying them. What is difficult to discover, and what may not be there to discover, is why this destruction was necessary. Identity effectively closed the book on Bourne, while leaving room for new books. Supremacy took that room in a harmful way, but redeemed itself by laying a foundation for organic sequels. So, why did Ultimatum then choose to close the book again in an incredibly forced and revisionist manner? We can’t know the reason from the films, so we are left only with the impact to consider.

Ultimatum wants to frame the debate on the series, but this is something it cannot completely achieve—both Identity and Supremacy exist within their individual goals. Each film cannot be judged by its descendents—they can only be judged by their predecessors. As a trilogy, Ultimatum must win the war for dominance, but its revisionist impact is felt only in its own story.

Story-wise, neither Supremacy nor Ultimatum are particularly revolutionary, but Supremacy is common in a very purposeful way—it’s intention to set up a status quo to frame a continuing series of stories is refreshingly simple and direct. This does not save the film from its own flaws. Editing and direction aside, the beginning and end to Supremacy’s story is abrupt—it is in its abruptness that it’s true goal of foundation-building is revealed. Without this abruptness, Supremacy may well have achieved an enjoyable, small scale, action thriller, but its weaknesses are there for the world to see.

In contrast, Ultimatum’s story is common because of it’s over the top nature, which gets no awards for originality. At the same time, Ultimatum has far less distracting from it’s main narrative. The film succeeds in it’s personal narrative goals: it brings to a conclusion a trilogy that barely exists and it tells a larger than life action story. Add to this the superior editing of Ultimatum and it actually stands out over Supremacy.

The Bourne Trilogy is an interesting accidental experiment in multi-film narrative. The three films together are interesting because of their conflicting goals. On the other hand, the disparate goals make for a poor trilogy. Identity was a standout movie because of its strong storytelling ability both in script and direction. Supremacy and Ultimatum fall short of this goal in both areas, while adding new problems of their own to the mix. While fascinating from the outside, inside the Bourne Trilogy is too disparate to succeed on the terms established for it in The Bourne Ultimatum. Luckily this disparity does not harm the individual films. Just because Ultimatum is the main cause of the trilogy’s conflicts, however, does not get The Bourne Supremacy off the hook. Supremacy creates similar problems for itself because of it’s own exercises in inter-film manipulation. It is only The Bourne Identity that rises above this error merely because of its position as the first film in what was not yet a series. The meta-filmic weight weighs most heavily on Ultimatum, but because it takes on the weight of reframing the series it dodges the harm that Supremacy brings on itself. Supremacy attempts to change the direction of the series. Ultimatum attempts to reinterpret the series. In reframing a film series it appears the best option is all or nothing.

Madness Placement: Identity is better than Ultimatum. Ultimatum is better than Supremacy. Identity is more coherent as a whole than The Long Goodbye. Ultimatum is weaker in constitution than The Long Goodbye.

The Long Goodbye

The Long Goodbye (1973)

Director: Robert Altman
Cinematographer: Vilmos Zsigmond
Editor: Lou Lombardo
Actors: Elliot Gould, Nina Van Pallandt, Sterling Hayden
Composer: John Williams

The Long Goodbye seems like another exercise in Altman’s voyeur style—the camera slowly floats along, always moving; shots begin from far away and off target from the players and then slide into a framing sequence. More then his other films, this one makes you feel like you are watching going-ons from outside. Every chance that Altman gets the camera is separated from the action by a window, as if you are looking in. Often, the camera is set in a long shot, as if we were spying from a distance. This feeling of spying on reality is further increased by the use of music in a diegetic manner through the film.

The film appears to have two intentions. As is often the case, the first intention is to tell a story—the investigation by Marlowe into the murder/suicide of the Lennoxes. However, as with most Altman film’s, the story is a secondary concern. The primary concern for Altman is to show the contemporary world through an outsider’s eyes. Altman achieves this goal largely through his use of framing.

Overall, the film shies away from any special editing. The editing is kept utilitarian. Most shots are long to medium, constantly shifting and these shots are only broken up by medium close-ups during conversation, which usually quickly return to a medium shot of all the actors in the scene. Beyond the logistics of showing conversation, the film rarely breaks away from the rule of medium to long shots. This limitation on the editing can be chalked up to Altman’s style—which always favors wide, lingering shots—but in this case, there is more suggested. The film’s constant framing of sequences through windows or from an extreme distance (for what needs to be shown) tends to convey a purposeful desire to make the viewer feel consciously feel like a voyeur. Combined with the use of diegetic music, the film seems to be pushing the viewer further into the role of an outsider looking at the real world. The film intends to make the viewer feel as if they are cast a drift in a world they don’t quite understand.

The outsider feeling is further enforced by the character of Marlowe. Marlowe acts like a man stumbling confused through the world. It is the intention of the direction to make you feel like Marlowe—like you exist in a world not quite your own that you are trying to understand, yet not quite grasping. The aimless nature of his investigation is matched by the wandering of the camera and these two details allow the audience to share in Marlowe’s separation.

In his use of the camera to create a sense of alienation that the audience shares with Marlowe, Altman is successful, but there are a few slips along the way. One aspect of the film that is lacking is the dialogue. Overall, the acting is good (although Sterling Hayden does tend towards caricature), but I can only assume that large portions of dialogue were freestyle—especially Marlowe—and the end results are less than satisfactory. The abundance of ums and ahs are irritating to say the least. Kept to a minimum, the lack of coherent dialogue from Marlowe could have been beneficial to the overall goal of the film, but as it stands it only hinders the presentation. Given Gould’s performance in M*A*S*H, I have to assume that this is largely part of the characterization of Marlowe, but it is taken too far. In a film tending towards a haunting sense of realism, caricature is a handicap.

Then there is the troublesome issue of the music at the end of the film. First, non-diegetic music appears to enter the film during Marlowe’s chase of Eileen’s car, but on further examination (Eileen’s singing along) it appears that this music is meant to be issuing from the car radio. Immediately after this, however, is non-diegetic music in the film—Marlowe’s second trip to Mexico. Although the music may issue from the bus, it continues once the scene has moved on and this explanation is no longer viable. These twofold instances of outside music sources (even if the one is just a badly represented internal music source) are a disappointing slip in a convention that is fairly well maintained throughout the rest of the film.

These musical slips are especially disappointing because it calls attention away from the only other examples of non-diegetic music in the film (and presumably what should be the only examples of non-diegetic music in the film)—the bookends of “Hooray for Hollywood.” These bookends signal Altman’s direction of the film. We are shown a film about Hollywood from an outsider’s perspective—and it is a damning condemnation. Altman is very clear in his opinion of Hollywood and the ending shows that we each have to force sense onto the world we are cast adrift in. Overall, Altman must be considered successful in getting his point across. Unlike M*A*S*H and Gosford Park where the wandering camera makes you feel as if you are moving through a room, The Long Goodbye casts the viewer alongside Marlowe—an outsider looking in at a world that doesn’t quite make sense.

Madness Placement: The Long Goodbye is the first film reviewed and stands alone.

The Measure of a Film, Part Two

Expression and Communication, Part One

All reviews of the arts are ultimately about opinion and these opinions should be clear to the reader. In film, what the reviewer considers the central goal of the film is the most important fact that can be stated. While it is possible for set design, costume design, lighting, acting, framing, and editing to be judged individually on less personal criteria, these individual evaluations don’t constitute a review of a film except in the most minimal sense. Only when these parts are viewed as a cohesive whole can a useful perspective be drawn from the disparate collection of opinions. Whether a film succeeds or fails, whether a film achieves a height of greatness or wallows in the dirt, is the result of the individual parts, but the ultimate criterion is the unity of the piece. The unity of all the parts can only be found in the intention or goal of the film. Judged as a standalone work, the intention of a film may seem different from reviewer to reviewer. Since the central goal or intention is what pulls an opinion of a film together, it is crucial that this goal be made known to the reader, so that they may judge the logic of your opinion for themselves.

If parts are considered individually, personal opinion can run completely unchecked. Does the reviewer have biases in lighting and acting? Does the reviewer have biases in costuming choices and editing? Taken individually, the various aspects of a film can be analyzed from a very personal point of view—but this point of view is a difficult thing to make clear, or for the reviewer to even be aware of. Stringing together varying opinions on the aspects of a film makes for an incoherent review, as these opinions may not always mesh.

The first unifying aspect of the whole is craft. Craft is the competency with which a part and the whole are put together. Although there is a limited range in which craft can be divined within each part without the overview of the whole, craft, as with everything else, is largely reviewed in terms of the big picture. This is why it is so important to determine exactly what the overall goal of a film is. Typically, craft is measured in terms of how skillfully each aspect advances the goal of the film. For a film determined to tell a story, costuming, set design, and acting are gauged on their ability to create a coherent world, while editing and framing are gauged on their ability to tell the story being represented. Unless a film is going off the beaten track, set design, costuming, acting, even lighting are easy to review because their sole goal is to create a coherent world for the story. To the end of telling a story, framing and editing can be judged by the smoothness and coherency with which they tell the story. At their most basic, editing and framing are judged by their invisibility.

Craft, however, cannot be separated from style and it is style that introduces all the thorny problems of film theory. In film, style is subjective in both creation and appreciation—it is the personal touch that makes a creation unique, but style that also makes a work open to other personal interpretations. This duel subjectivity makes style a difficult thing to convincingly review. But it is the multitude of style and the conflicting opinions that oppose each style that make each film more or less distinctive, more or less divisive. It is the diversity of man that makes critique possible—it is that same diversity that makes opinion so fallible. Without craft, style has no expression—without style, craft has no uniqueness. It is the thing that makes complete certainty impossible that draws us to examine cinema.

The Measure of a Film, Part One

A New Medium

Film is a medium, a medium within which any number of goals can be achieved. It is not what those goals are that interests us today, but how those goals are achieved. As a medium, film bears a close resemblance to theatre. In fact, there are only two aspects that conclusively separate film from theatre: framing and editing. Framing is the control of what within a scene is shown within a shot. Editing is the placement of shots in sequence with one another. In the use of these two tools, film justifies itself as a medium independent of theatre, and displays its greatest strengths.

There are two aspects that make up film—content and form. Content may be identical to theatre, but form is practically unique to film. Form is the combination of framing and editing. Form may be called the storytelling aspect of film, although this is not completely accurate. Form is the way the audience is manipulated by images. While the music may go a long way towards telling the audience how to feel about the action in the film, this music is still part of the content. Content is what makes up the images and the action of the film. The set design, acting, lighting, costume design, soundtrack—all of these things are part of the content of a film because they constitute the straight action of the piece. Form is the rule of image over action. The placement of images one after the other and the control of the content of the frame both influence what is felt and read into a specific action. This degree of control that editing and framing provide is not possible in theatre and its presence is what separates film from theatre.

Like theatre, a film’s audience is limited in its perspective—the audience experiences what is placed in front of them. In this way, both film and theatre—in this aspect at least—are a passive art. In theatre, the ability to frame is limited by the position of the audience, but film possesses the ability to change this position. A film is able to control the attentions of the audience. While theatre must deal with the roving eye of the audience, film places the point of focus right before the audience. And this point of focus is not the only thing controlled—the point of view is also supplied by the film. The ability to manage exactly what the audience sees and the way it sees it is a huge advantage in manipulating the effect of what is being presented. Different framings can produce different feelings and thoughts in an audience regardless of the actual content of the shot. This power over the content of the film is a huge advantage that film possesses over theatre.

Editing provides another powerful tool, which separates film from theatre. Editing stimulates the audience’s mind in a way that is not possible in the single perspective medium of theatre. The human mind makes stories out of what is placed before it—it sees cause and effect, and connections. Film plays on this ability to engage the audience unconsciously. Images that would have had no special meaning apart may have profound impact together. The movement from one perspective to another can represent a character’s move or a character’s mood. Editing can make movement more dynamic or its absence can let an action speak for itself. Editing gives a filmmaker the power to stimulate where there would previously been no stimulation, or to make meaning where there was none before. Editing makes film more fluid than theatre could hope to be.

Theatre and film are two closely related mediums, but they are two different mediums that can achieve different things. However, this difference is not in the representations that take place on the stage. The content is not what separates film from theatre—a play may be just as realistic as a film. It is in form that film becomes its own creature. Framing and editing combine to alter the content in a way different from any other medium—it is this interplay that is of the most interest to us as reviewers.